I am a novelist. My YA fiction published by Faber in the UK / Alfred Knopf in the US. I am currently writing my debut adult novel, 'The Last Days of England' for William Heinemann which will be out in Jan 09.
My first novel, 'A Nicer Way To Die' was published earlier this year. A review in 'The Sunday Telegraph' summed it up: 'I burnt a lot of midnight oil and even more adrenaline reading A Nicer Way to Die by Sam Mills (Faber, £6.99). It starts with a school coach crash in France: James and his step-brother Henry are apparently the only survivors and shelter in a deserted mansion. Mills never lets the tension drop, skilfully weaving into the claustrophobic atmosphere flashbacks which build up the picture of a deeply disturbed boy who has made James's already fragile life hell since he and his father moved in.' Another review described it as 'a cross between deadkidsongs and The Shining'. Not that I've ever been able to get even halfway through 'The S' without switching off and suffering nightmares for weeks. Yeah, I'm a scaredy-cat...
I've just completed my second novel, 'The Boys Who Saved the World'. It's a thriller, political satire, romance and crisis-of-faith novel all rolled into one. It centres on a group of disillusioned schoolboys who set up their own religion: The Religion of Hebetheus. They become obsessed with purifying the world from all evil. When they develop suspicions that an Asian girl at their school is a terrorist, they kidnap her, run away to a remote cottage in the countryside and send out videos to the media declaring only they can win the war on terror. But as the police close in on them, they begin to question whether or not their hostage is really guilty...
I got published by pretending to be a man.
